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I was watching the Weather Channel this weekend and it's kind of like that. In Maine we're preparing for our third noreaster in two weeks, so the reporters don't have their normal amount of post storm drama. They're just shooting on to the next storm. Covering Trump's administration is like covering the weather; always something new coming, can't focus on the past for long.

"Looks like we're in for another shitstorm here in DC", said the young reporter in a bright yellow raincoat. "This year and a month long shitnado has left our Capital devastated. There are signs that a Mueller front might provide a break some time soon, but for now you'll need your shit umbrella and a pair of galoshes as the shit keeps raining down"

Listening to the dollop about what happened there was staggering. I had no idea how much bullshit and open faced corruption was going on. It's complete garbage and none of them ever faced consequences.

It’s absolutely terrifying. These monsters certainly have the capacity to be even more destructive than the previous GOP administration.

But as things currently stand, George W. Bush has the blood of half a million people on his hands. Trump might someday exceed that but its still possible he might not. So far, the actual deaths that we can lay at his door are mostly from Puerto Rico.

Who exactly is the "WH" though? Trump? A staffer who now has to do damage control? They always say "The White House" is frustrated, as if they're trying to garner sympathy or something when these are the actions of this white house.

White House officials were alarmed by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos' struggle to answer basic questions about the nation's schools and failure to defend the administration's newly proposed school safety measures during a tour of television interviews Sunday and Monday, according to two sources familiar with their reaction.

SO the "who" is unnamed "White house officials" and the source is unnamed sources "familiar."

Then critically think. Who are these officials and who are these sources? Why did they tell the reporters these things?

In this case this means the sources are almost certainly just junior staff or aides relating what was occurring in their presence, possibly at the direction of their boss.

Why are both "White house officials" AND the sources unnamed? Is it becasue they want anonimity? or because it would out the source?

It could be a deliberate leak. IF it's a deliberate leak, this is likely Kelly doing damage control. "Tell reporters that "there was serious concern." about DeVos's comments. The vague nature of the report lends itself to this.

If it's NOT a deliberate leak, this could be mean "Kelly hit the roof when he saw the video and yelled on the phone for a while." The sources could be unnamed because they might be only one or two possible sources for a particular event and they'd be outed as leaking the story.

The first 2/3 of your reply is an excellent primer on critical thinking, and is very similar to the discussions I have with students when we talk about health research and developing best practices. I loved it.

Bingo. When someone asks you if schools are getting better in Michigan because of vouchers and charters you say "Oh yes! Light years better!", not "I don't know". If you are challenged for making the yes statement, then you just spew fake anecdotal crap about how parents love to have "choices", and come up with your rosiest examples. If challenged further with facts you shut it down by just denying they are true.

She's a shit con artist, don't worry, they'll get a better one with equally bad ideas.

Of course she is a con artist. Anybody who gets rich off of a MLM scam is nothing more than a snake oil salesman. I'm sure her ultimate dream is to turn education into some sort of Amway-esque pyramid scheme.

Wait. Being an Amway heiress, donating massively to the GOP, having a brother who ran a mercenary squad, never having (or wanting to) set foot in a classroom, and believing that schools should become "kingdoms of god" does not qualify her?

Trump constantly shoots himself in the foot, undermining his own agenda. If we're forced to suffer an absolutely corrupt President, I'd prefer he also be incompetent and unable to cover up his corruption.

Just ignore Trump's twitter tantrums and daily gaffes; those messages aren't meant for you anyways.

She got ripped apart by the most simple questions... Everything was just "under review" and "will be examined closely." She couldn't answer any questions at any level, other than attempt to avoid them.. What made it look even worse is the interviewer attempting to sympathize and humanize her as a "grandmother" and a "champion of the poor" while simultaneously giving her space and comfort to open up and make herself look worse.

Because she thought the older (likely rich) white lady host would be super kind to her like all of the other older rich white people in her country club... And it looked like she was going to be nice too. (talking about her being a good grandmother, trying to improve schools for poor people, etc.. in the intro) Only it turned out to be a huge number of loaded questions.

didn't she pretty much flunk her interview when getting rubber stamped into the position originally? This shouldnt suprise ANYONE. Even the people who approved her. They passed her despite the fact she was shown to be completely incompetent on the subject matter she was being hired to run. Bullshit they are shocked. The only thing they are shocked about is that she agreed to a 60 minutes interview so woefully unprepared.

Betsy and her husband Dick are chief investors in and board members of Neurocore, a group of brain performance centers offering biofeedback therapy for disorders such as depression, attention deficit disorder, autism, and anxiety.[55][56][57] The therapy consists of showing movies to patients and interrupting them when they become distracted, in an effort to retrain their brains. According to The New York Times, a review of Neurocore's claims and interviews with medical experts suggest that the company's conclusions are unproven and its methods questionable.

I had a psych professor who said biofeedback therapy can be effective when done right. Stuff like watching your blood pressure or pulse and calming yourself to intentionally lower it. That's real, because it's basically meditation and meditation is genuinely beneficial. But I've never heard of watching videos as a biofeedback technique. That sounds less like meditation and more like attempted brainwashing.

She ran a company that claimed they could cure Autism, ADD, and ADHD with a method that had no scientific merit whatsoever, taking lots of money from desperate parents looking for a cure for their kids. Most of the people that worked at these places had no formal training in treating kids with any of these conditions.

I was really looking forward to grade levels being replaced by Amway pin levels. Can't wait for my son to go Double Diamond and earn part of his GPA from all the hard work of the younger students below him.

Except... aren't con artists supposed to be good at peddling bullshit? And none of them are.

Because, for the record, that's what the White House is upset about. They don't care that she's shoveling shit and telling us its gold. What they care about is that, with this interview, she tripped and fell headfirst into the steaming pile.

The White House is alarmed? DeVos botched responses to the questions? I call bullshit.

DeVos's answers align with her twisted worldview. She does not believe that we should invest in things like school buildings and public institutions, because she does not want to see public education thrive. She discusses schools in terms of "individual students" in order to advocate for choice. That is, she wants to make public schools poorer by diverting dollars to vouchers that make private schools cheaper for the rich. In turn, our public schools will have a greater concentration of students in vulnerable situations, and they will not have the money to achieve desirable outcomes.

Similar to other cases, this Administration chooses to not support public education SO THAT it can point to it and say "See? It's failing. We need something different." But the root of the problem is neglect.

The Administration is not alarmed, because it shares DeVos's worldview. Her responses during this interview are messed up, but they are not surprising.

They're not upset about the content her responses, they're just upset that she delivered them so poorly. They don't want people paying attention to what they're doing, but now there's a whole day of news stories about what DeVos is doing because of her awful interview.

There's also times when she's mentioned in connection to repealing protections for students that are either destroying them financially for her personal benefit, or just making their lives worse to further some hateful ideology that pretends to be Christian.

Similar to other cases, this Administration chooses to not support public education SO THAT it can point to it and say "See? It's failing. We need something different." But the root of the problem is neglect.

“Starve the beast”. Their actions are so appallingly transparent but the majority of people don’t even care enough to know what’s going on, much less care enough to do anything about it.

She didn’t just marry rich. Her parents were already billionaires when she married into a family of billionaires. She has led an utterly sheltered life and knows nothing of the world. She’s there to do her brother’s bidding.

About 20 years ago I was duped into going to an Amway convention where all of the top diamond distributors and company leadership gave their " life stories" in an attempt to boost to morale of the lowly, poor souls who spent their life savings, re-mortgaged their homes, and added excessive debt to their already maxed out credit cards in the hopes of achieving even 1/10 of what the people on stage have done.

Had one guy, some triple diamond or something like that come on and spout off some bullshit story about how bad off he was in college, how he lost everything trying to build his "business". Then proceeded to tell everyone how he's never used an ATM, that he never carries anything less than 10k cash on him at all times. How he travels to these bullshit meetings by private helicopter that picks him up at his house on Whitefish Lake in Montana.

The guy was about as fake as I've ever seen. The amazing thing wasn't his story though, it was watching the thousands of people around me eating it up... crying... raising their hands in the air like they were praising jebus. It was absolutely disgusting.

If you've never had an opportunity to experience first-hand where our esteemed Secretary of Education comes from and pawns off as truth... just go to one of those events. Its the saddest place I've ever been to... And I've been to Iraq and Afghanistan for Pete's sake!

DeVos was born Elisabeth Prince on January 8, 1958. She grew up in Holland, Michigan, the daughter of Elsa (Zwiep) Prince (later, Broekhuizen) and Edgar Prince, a billionaire industrialist.[19][20] Both of her parents are of Dutch ancestry, and her family's original surname was "Prins".[21] Edgar was the founder of Prince Corporation, an automobile parts supplier based in Holland, Michigan.[11][19]

But she married richer...

The DeVos family is one of Michigan's wealthiest.[28] Betsy DeVos's husband, Richard Marvin "Dick" DeVos Jr., is a multi-billionaire heir to the Amway fortune who ran Amway's parent company, Alticor, from 1993 to 2002. Dick DeVos is a major donor to conservative political campaigns and social causes,[29][30][31] and was the 2006 Republican nominee for Governor of Michigan.[19][32] Dick's father, Richard Marvin DeVos Sr., co-founded Amway and is also the owner of the Orlando Magic NBA basketball team. Richard DeVos was listed by Forbes in 2016 as having a net worth of $5.1 billion, making him America's 88th wealthiest individual.[28][33]

The city is perhaps best known for its Dutch heritage, which serves not only as a part of the city's cultural identity, but the local economy as well
Ottawa County was originally populated by Ottawa Indians. In 1846, Reverend Alex Tomasik established the Old Wing Mission as an outreach to the native population.

Holland was settled in 1847 by Dutch Calvinist separatists, under the leadership of Dr. Albertus van Raalte.[8] Dire economic conditions in the Netherlands compelled them to emigrate, while their desire for religious freedom led them to unite and settle together as a group.[9]

Van Raalte and his colony settled on land in the midst of the Ottawa (Odawa) people's Old Wing Mission Colony near the Black River where it streamed to Black Lake (now Lake Macatawa) which, in turn, led to Lake Michigan. Joint occupation by the two communities was not a marriage made in heaven. Eventually, the Dutch settlers purchased the land from the natives, who moved north in an effort to preserve their way of life and culture.[10]

Unrelated but hilarious:

Holland was known as the "City of Churches."[15] There are 170 churches in the greater Holland area, many of which are with the Reformed Church in America and Christian Reformed Church in North America denominations. The city is the home to the church that started the trend of the "What Would Jesus Do?" bracelets in 1989.[16]

In the 1840s, Calvinist immigrants desiring more religious freedom immigrated. West Michigan in particular has become associated with Dutch American culture, and the highly conservative influence of the Dutch Reformed Church, centering on the cities of Holland[1] and (to a lesser extent) Grand Rapids. Dutch is still spoken by the elderly and their children in Western Michigan. As of 2010, 5.1% of Michiganders are of Dutch descent.

During the early nineteenth century, large numbers of Dutch farmers, forced by high taxes and low wages, started immigrating to America. They mainly settled down in the Midwest, especially Michigan, Illinois and Iowa. In the 1840s, Calvinist immigrants desiring more religious freedom immigrated. West Michigan in particular has become associated with Dutch American culture, and the highly conservative influence of the Dutch Reformed Church, centering on the cities of Holland and (to a lesser extent) Grand Rapids.

She fucking killed it. If there is one silver lining to the Fox Newsification of the media, it's that when Conservatives are interviewed by a real news organization they are woefully unprepared for the shellacking that they receive.

Well look, I already told you! I deal with the goddamn administration so the teachers don't have to! I have people skills! I am good at dealing with people! Can't you understand that? What the hell is wrong with you people?

That's why they won't let Trump hold a press conference. He fucks up the softball questions, badly. No way he could handle hard hitting ones. He would probably be in cuffs before the press conference was over.

Oh, yes bigly nobody loves America more than me, folks, no one, they all say- Russia but I only met Putin once when he asked me for a favor but I can't talk about that, I don't want to get in trouble but it definitely- this election they say- there's no collusion, okay? I didn't collude with Russia, it's actually Russia that colluded with me-

Remember when the same level of journalism was applied to Trump, but he was being "treated unfair", "asked the hardest questions known to man", when all it really was were basic questions that most politicians would answer summarily?

It was as bad as her confirmation hearing. Nobody was unaware of how idiotic and unqualified she is. Which is exactly why she made the point publicly that her family gave $200M to the Republican party and she expected a return on this investment by being confirmed.

They don't even hide this so any fiction of being "alarmed" rings as hollow as DeVos' confused little head.

I love how conservatives call the other side snowflakes, yet when presented with actual questions on her policy, all of a sudden it's "stop attacking Betso's you're being mean to her!"

Seriously, go look at all the conservative replies to that link. They'll all ignoring her complete ignorance and blaming the "liberal interviewer" for being mean. It would be hilarious if it's not apparent how brainwashed they are.

When asking a question & repeatedly cutting them off b/c they’re not giving you the answer you want, it’s very annoying,rude, and frustrating to watch! #TodayShow #SavannaGuthrie #BetsyDeVos If asking a conceptual question, expect the same kind of answer.

Im still absolutely floored that anyone could think arming teachers be an appropriate response to school shootings. Ie that they won't try to prevent more school shootings but instead rely on random citiizens trying to shoot the perpetrator as they occur. Instead of, you know, trying to prevent them from occurring in the first place.

To be clear, they're not upset about her incompetence. They're upset that Trump got bad press because she let the media know the truth about her incompetence. It's like Flynn and Porter... Nobody in the WH cares until the media has a story that makes Trump look bad.

Fox: "Well there you have it folks, we've cut straight through the liberal lies and gotten to the heart of the matter. Thank you Betsy for your valued input and continued fight against the liberal lying media!"

DeVos: "I like cupcakes"

Fox: "We know you do Betsy, we know. And on to the next topic, on how OBAMA'S EPA is still killing jobs, and how Trump our savior is going to bring back coal jobs."

The woman who’s literally never been to a public school, and neither have her children, and owns a company that stands to profit from destroying them doesn’t get public education? Who could’ve seen that coming?!

The White House released its proposals for school safety measures after a shooting Florida killed 17 people. Part of the proposal includes a task force to examine ways to prevent future mass shootings, headed by DeVos. Though the proposals don't include raising the age limit to purchase firearms from 18 to 21 -- as President Donald Trump once suggested -- DeVos told Savannah Guthrie on NBC's "Today" show that "everything is on the table."

"I don't think assault weapons carried in schools carried by any school personnel is the appropriate thing," DeVos said. "But again, I think this is an issue that is best decided at the local level by communities and by states."

Florida passed a bill to raise the age of weapon purchases from 18 to 21.

These people believe in "states' rights" only to permit conservative states to choose to comply with a conservative agenda that can't be passed at the federal level. For instance: abortion, voter ID, and repealing the ACA.

And on issues where they can shoehorn in the conservative agenda at the federal level, states' rights go out the window. For instance: network neutrality and selling national parks to oil and gas companies.

If you want to see why developing nations suck and why the Iraqi military got their ass handed to them by ISIS when the war started this is why. Important government positions are filled not by competent experts in the field they are filled by politically connected loyalists who don't know what they are doing

We can't politicize yet another murder. This poor rich poor girl was literally brutally murdered figuratively, on live TV. We need to be focusing on mental health, and how this vulnerable white person is crazy. /s

She admits that she doesn't know how schools are performing in her home state. If you pick a random state, yea I get that you might not know, but this is your home state. It's almost like she doesn't care or something.

Her brother, Erik Prince, is a cofounder and principle at Blackwater. There was no money for schools a year ago. Suddenly, there are millions available to train teachers and provide school security. Who do you think will profit from that contract?